I was just sure the grave had to be in Oakland Cemetery in Russellville.

Several of my Williamses, including Maxie and Jo's two daughters, Mildred Imognene, and Katherine Leah are buried there.

Why would we have such a large photo - the photo itself measures about 6" by 6" not including its black cardboard mount - unless this was the grave of someone in the family?

Mercifully, our temp stayed under 100 today - it was only 99.

So my first pass through the cemetery was in the car. And none of the tall monuments matched.

So I got out of the car in selected locations and started looking for a monument that could have been broken off, with other stones around it as in the photo. With a raised concrete border around the plot. Or concrete overgrown with grass.

Grace's grave is with her paternal grandmother's, and her uncle's. Her grandma - Josiah's mother - was Elizabeth Frances Gilpin. After she divorced Josiah's dad, she married Samuel Reed Judd. The stone for the family plot says Shinn on one side, and Judd on the other.

The video below is not old. It's the contents of the video that represents the treasures.

One of my Williams cousins and his wife traveled to Franklin County, KY last summer to photograph the graves of his great grandmother (who was my great-great grandmother), Catherine (Mueller) Williams. He videotaped all the graves in the Williams' family plot and included some wonderful bonus material.

The family plot is in Frankfort Cemetery.

Click here to view the video.My thanks and gratitude go to cousin Cedric, who generously shared the video with me...

These are the gravestones of my great-great grandparents, Thomas Jefferson Wharton, II and his wife, Rutha Evaline Coleman.

Thomas was the son of Thomas Jefferson Wharton and Sarah Sally Duncan, born on 27 Feb 1832 in Alta Vista, Gainesville, Co., GA. Rutha was the daughter of John Henry Harrison Coleman and Cynthia Cochran, born on 1 Oct 1837 in Caroll County, GA.

They married on 26 Jul 1855 in St. Clair County, AL and were the parents of 9 children I have been able to document.

Thomas J Wharton

Rutha E Wharton

Thomas died on 16 Mar 1908, and Rutha on 19 May 1911. They are buried in St. Joe Cemetery, Pope Co., AR.

Woodrow L. Rainey, S. 1/c.Woodrow L Rainey, S. 1/c., 28, was killed in action in the South Pacific, the Navy Department has advised his wife, Mrs. Myrtle Nolen Rainey. He was the son of Mr. and Mrs. E.C. Rainey of the Griffin Flat community.

There are only the two photos in my collection of Madgie. In each, she is shown with one or both of her children.

Madgie had a twin sister, Maggie. They were one of three sets of twins in their extended McBrayer/Herrington family, and older half sisters of my grandmother, Addie Louise Herrington.

I don't know which sister was born first, but they arrived on a hot summer day in late July 1898 in Clark County, daughters of Julia Ann Callaway and Robert Bruce McBrayer.

Maggie died in 1965. Madgie barely made it out of her teens.Madgie McBrayer married Homer Buck on 10 Jul 1913, just a couple of weeks short of her 15th birthday.

I don't know the names of either of Madgie's children, the youngest of whom died in 1918 also, and whose gravestone in DeGray Cemetery simply says "Baby Buck."

Madgie's stone was equally simple.

Her obituary appeared in the Southern Standard on 24 Oct 1918.

Mrs. Homer Buck died at her home in this city on Wednesday night of last week with pneumonia. The deceased was 20 years of age and leaves a husband and two children, besides father, mother, three sisters and three brothers. Funeral services were held Tuesday afternoon and the remains were buried at DeGray Cemetery.

A devoted husband and loving father. He has entered into the fullness of life. He lived a peaceful, constructive and an honorable life and such a life smiles at death. He lived no inglorious life and came to a peaceful and glorious death. He was the bough broken under the load of ripened fruit and such as he have passed into God's acre, the christian's home.

And the earth is mounded up behind the stone. There's a footstone there. Like a fairly recent grave.

Next to a retaining wall very similar to the one that surrounds the (former) Williams family plot in Oakland Cemetery, Russellville, AR. Where Katharine Leah Williams is buried. She was Minnie's niece.